Spain

January 12, 2015

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Click for a compilation of articles highlighting NGO Monitor’s contributions to the broader conversation about NGOs, funding, and accountability in Spain. These include blogs and op-eds written by NGO Monitor and staff, as well as articles citing NGO Monitor, or otherwise relevant to our mission.

Spanish government funding to Israeli, Palestinian, and Spanish NGOs is primarily provided through the Agency for International Cooperation and Development (AECID), a subdivision of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The Spanish Cooperation Office in Jerusalem oversees projects funded through AECID.

On June 28, 2017, in the Spanish Parliament in Madrid, NGO Monitor and ACOM presented their joint report highlighting Spanish funding for non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that carry out political warfare campaigns against Israel. At this event, MK Yair Lapid, Chair of the centrist Yesh Atid party, encouraged his counterparts in Spain to take steps to prevent government funding for such organizations, many of which support BDS (boycott, divestment, and sanctions) campaigns against Israel, incite to violence, and/or promote antisemitism. Some of these groups also have alleged ties to terrorist organizations.

NGO Monitor’s comprehensive report on Spanish government funding from 2009 to 2011 listed over 40 political advocacy Israeli, Palestinian, and Spanish organizations that received Spanish funding. Between 2009 and 2011, approximately €15 million in Spanish government funds were transferred to political advocacy NGOs active in demonization, including promotion of BDS and political warfare that fuel the conflict. The funding of polarizing Israeli political NGOs was also an example of efforts to manipulate Israeli democracy through foreign government.

For the years 2009-2011, NGO Monitor identified Spanish NGO allocations and project details for radical Israeli and Palestinian NGOs, including the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD), the Applied Research Institute Jerusalem (ARIJ), and Breaking the Silence. No information was found on the processes used to evaluate and approve this NGO funding, in particular in light of these organizations’ continued politicized campaigns against Israel.

In 2012, and in wake of NGO Monitor’s draft report, AECID reduced funding to three political advocacy NGOs active in the Arab-Israeli conflict, with a combined allocation of €1.6 million, marking a substantial reduction. The three ongoing grantees are Rabbis for Human Rights, Al Maqdese and ARIJ (see tables below).

Spain was a primary forum in Europe for NGO-led “lawfare” strategies against Israeli officials. For example, the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI), an Israeli NGO active in demonization efforts against Israel, received €60,000 (2010) from AECID. In 2009, PCATI signed a petition submitted to the Spanish government opposing a parliamentary resolution “that limits the exercise of universal the Spanish courts.” The resolution was introduced in the Spanish parliament following lawfare cases against several foreign nationals, including jurisdiction of Israeli officials.

Additional NGO support comes from Spain’s Autonomous Communities and Regions. For example, as part of a project funded by the Basque government, Spanish NGO coalition MEWANDO published a newsletter utilizing “apartheid” and “genocide” rhetoric and featuring a cartoon depicting an African-American lynching victim and a Jewish child in the Holocaust as “Palestinians” (link no longer available).

The Spanish NGO Xarxa d’enllac amb Palestina (Link Network with Palestine), funded by Barcelona and Catalonia, in May 2012, organized a concert in Barcelona to mark the Palestinian Nakba. In May 2011, Xarxa signed a letter titled “Enrique Iglesias, don’t sing for the Israeli apartheid!” which advised Enrique Iglesias, a Spanish musician, against performing in Israel.

The municipality of Barcelona provided €56,000 for the March 2010 Russell Tribunal on Palestine, which calls for “existing legal actions and campaigns in the context of BDS to be stepped up and widened within the EU and globally.” The Russell Tribunal was organized by Spanish NGO Nova (funding from Catalonia).

On November 29-December 3, 2014, the Andalusian Fund of Municipalities for International Solidarity (FAMSI) organized an International Conference of Local Government and Civil Society Organizations in Support of Palestine, which allegedly promoted antisemitic sentiments and BDS campaigns against Israel. The Simon Wiesenthal Center accused the Spanish government of funding the conference and its coordinator, FAMSI, through the government’s Agency for International Cooperation and Development (AECID). According to news reports, the Spanish Foreign Ministry rejected the allegations without clarification, but did not respond to Israeli government requests for a formal explanation.

Spanish Funding to Israeli/Palestinian Political NGOs

(Unless noted, 2015-2016 data based on quarterly financial reports submitted to the Israeli Registrar of Non-Profits; 2013-2014 Information taken from annual reports)

Related Articles

Public funding from Spain to politicized non-governmental organizations (NGOs) involved in the Arab-Israeli conflict is widespread and highly decentralized, correlating to several levels of governance in Spain. Funds are managed and allocated by the central government, autonomous communities, provincial deputations, municipalities, and bar associations – and reflect deep political fissures and regional radicalization.

Spanish government funding is allocated to Palestinian, Israeli, and Spanish NGOs that are among the leaders in ideological campaigns to delegitimize Israel via BDS, lawfare, and other forms of demonization.

According to a December 16, 2007 Ha'aretz report, "an investment of hundreds of thousands of dollars, loads of time and countless attempts at intensive Spanish-brokered talks between Israelis and Palestinians went down the drain," when a "peace gathering" scheduled to take place December 14-16 in Madrid The Forum for a Just Peace in the Middle East "collapsed before it could even get started."